1.
Ireland
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Ireland is an island in the North Atlantic. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel, the Irish Sea, Ireland is the second-largest island of the British Isles, the third-largest in Europe, and the twentieth-largest on Earth. Politically, Ireland is divided between the Republic of Ireland, which covers five-sixths of the island, and Northern Ireland, in 2011, the population of Ireland was about 6.4 million, ranking it the second-most populous island in Europe after Great Britain. Just under 4.6 million live in the Republic of Ireland, the islands geography comprises relatively low-lying mountains surrounding a central plain, with several navigable rivers extending inland. The island has lush vegetation, a product of its mild, thick woodlands covered the island until the Middle Ages. As of 2013, the amount of land that is wooded in Ireland is about 11% of the total, there are twenty-six extant mammal species native to Ireland. The Irish climate is moderate and classified as oceanic. As a result, winters are milder than expected for such a northerly area, however, summers are cooler than those in Continental Europe. Rainfall and cloud cover are abundant, the earliest evidence of human presence in Ireland is dated at 10,500 BC. Gaelic Ireland had emerged by the 1st century CE, the island was Christianised from the 5th century onward. Following the Norman invasion in the 12th century, England claimed sovereignty over Ireland, however, English rule did not extend over the whole island until the 16th–17th century Tudor conquest, which led to colonisation by settlers from Britain. In the 1690s, a system of Protestant English rule was designed to materially disadvantage the Catholic majority and Protestant dissenters, with the Acts of Union in 1801, Ireland became a part of the United Kingdom. Northern Ireland saw much civil unrest from the late 1960s until the 1990s and this subsided following a political agreement in 1998. In 1973 the Republic of Ireland joined the European Economic Community while the United Kingdom, Irish culture has had a significant influence on other cultures, especially in the fields of literature. Alongside mainstream Western culture, an indigenous culture exists, as expressed through Gaelic games, Irish music. The culture of the island shares many features with that of Great Britain, including the English language, and sports such as association football, rugby, horse racing. The name Ireland derives from Old Irish Eriu and this in turn derives from Proto-Celtic *Iveriu, which is also the source of Latin Hibernia. Iveriu derives from a root meaning fat, prosperous, during the last glacial period, and up until about 9000 years ago, most of Ireland was covered with ice, most of the time

2.
Holy Cross Abbey
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The Holy Cross Abbey in Tipperary is a restored Cistercian monastery in Holycross near Thurles, County Tipperary, Ireland, situated on the River Suir. It takes its name from a relic of the True Cross or Holy rood, the fragment of that Holy rood was brought to Ireland by the Plantagenet Queen, Isabella of Angoulême, around 1233. She was the widow of King John and bestowed the relic on the original Cistercian Monastery in Thurles, which she then rebuilt, andrew, on November 30,1601 at Holy Cross Abbey. At that period it was a point for the defence of religious freedom. It was the last victory before the defeat at Kinsale The Holy Rood relic was last exposed for veneration in 1632. Local people used the ruins as a burial place after 1740. It became a national monument in 1880, to be preserved. Special legislation in the Dáil on its 50th anniversary,21 January 1969, enabled Holy Cross Abbey to be restored as a place of Catholic worship, exceptionally for a national monument. The Sacristan of St. Peters Basilica in the Vatican provided an authenticated relic of the Holy Cross, two crosses were stolen, including the cross containing the relics of the true cross, in a raid on the Abbey on 11 October 2011. A portable angle grinder, hammer and screwdriver were used by the raiders to remove the relics that gave the village. In January 2012, the relics of the cross were reported to have been retrieved. List of abbeys and priories in Ireland The Thurles to Clonmel via Cashel bus route serves Holycross, the nearest railway station is Thurles railway station approximately 6 km distant. Holy Cross Abbey, Tipperary on Irelands Hidden Gems Discover Ireland page

3.
House of Plantagenet
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The House of Plantagenet was a royal house which originated from the lands of Anjou in France. The family held the English throne from 1154, with the accession of Henry II, until 1485, under the Plantagenets, England was transformed, although this was only partly intentional. The Plantagenet kings were forced to negotiate compromises such as Magna Carta. These constrained royal power in return for financial and military support, the king was no longer just the most powerful man in the nation, holding the prerogative of judgement, feudal tribute and warfare. He now had defined duties to the realm, underpinned by a justice system. A distinct national identity was shaped by conflict with the French, Scots, Welsh and Irish, in the 15th century, the Plantagenets were defeated in the Hundred Years War and beset with social, political and economic problems. Popular revolts were commonplace, triggered by the denial of numerous freedoms, the Tudors worked to centralise English royal power, which allowed them to avoid some of the problems that had plagued the last Plantagenet rulers. The resulting stability allowed for the English Renaissance, and the advent of early modern Britain, Richard of York, 3rd Duke of York, adopted Plantagenet as his family name in the 15th century. Plantegenest had been a 12th-century nickname for his ancestor Geoffrey, count of Anjou, one of many popular theories suggests the common broom, planta genista in medieval Latin, as the source of the nickname. It is uncertain why Richard chose this name, although during the Wars of the Roses it emphasised Richards status as Geoffreys patrilineal descendant. It was only in the late 17th century that it passed into common usage among historians, the three Angevin kings were Henry II, Richard I and John, Angevin can also refer to the period of history in which they reigned. Many historians identify the Angevins as a distinct English royal house, Angevin is also used in reference to any sovereign or government derived from Anjou. The term Angevin Empire was coined by Kate Norgate in 1887, the Empire portion of Angevin Empire has been controversial. In 1986 a convention of historians concluded that there had not been an Angevin state, and therefore no Angevin Empire, nonetheless, historians have continued to use Angevin Empire. The later counts of Anjou, including the Plantagenets, descended from Geoffrey II, Count of Gâtinais, in 1060 the couple inherited the title via cognatic kinship from an Angevin family that was descended from a noble named Ingelger, whose recorded history dates from 870. During the 10th and 11th centuries, power struggles occurred between rulers in northern and western France including those of Anjou, Normandy, Brittany, Poitou, Blois, Maine, and the kings of France. In the early 12th century Geoffrey of Anjou married Empress Matilda, King Henry Is only surviving legitimate child and heir to the English throne. As a result of marriage, Geoffreys son Henry II inherited the English throne as well as Norman and Angevin titles, thus marking the beginning of the Angevin

4.
County Tipperary
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County Tipperary is a county in Ireland. Tipperary County Council is the government authority for the county. It is located in the province of Munster, the county is named after the town of Tipperary, and was established in the early thirteenth century, shortly after the Norman invasion of Ireland. The population of the county was 160,441 at the 2016 census. The largest towns are Clonmel, Nenagh and Thurles, Tipperary is the sixth largest of the 32 counties by area and the 12th largest by population. It is the third largest of Munsters 6 counties by size and it is also the largest landlocked county in Ireland. The region is part of the plain of Ireland, but the diverse terrain contains several mountain ranges, the Knockmealdown, the Galtee, the Arra Hills. Most of the county is drained by the River Suir, the part by tributaries of the River Shannon, the eastern part by the River Nore. No part of the county touches the coast, the centre is known as the Golden Vale, a rich pastoral stretch of land in the Suir basin which extends into counties Limerick and Cork. Parishes were delineated after the Down Survey as a subdivision, with multiple townlands per parish. The civil parishes had some use in local taxation and were included on the nineteenth century maps of the Ordnance Survey of Ireland, for poor law purposes, District Electoral Divisions replaced the civil parishes in the mid-nineteenth century. There are 199 civil parishes in the county, townlands are the smallest officially defined geographical divisions in Ireland, there are 3,159 townlands in the county. Following the Norman invasion of Ireland, the Kingdom of Munster was claimed as a lordship, by 1210, the sheriffdom of Munster shired into the shires of Tipperary and Limerick. In 1328, Tipperary was granted to the Earls of Ormond as a county palatine or liberty, the grant excluded church lands such as the archiepiscopal see of Cashel, which formed the separate county of Cross Tipperary. The county was divided again in 1838. When the Local Government Act 1898 established county councils to replace the grand jury for civil functions and their names were changed from Tipperary North/South Riding to North/South Tipperary by the Local Government Act 2001, which redesignated all administrative counties as simply counties. The Local Government Reform Act 2014 has amalgamated the two counties and restored a single county of Tipperary, following the Local Government Reform Act 2014, Tipperary County Council is the local government authority for the county. The authority is a merger of two separate authorities North Tipperary County Council and South Tipperary County Council which operated up until June 2014